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Sunday, May 13, 2012

HOW TO IMPROVE SCHOOLS

In the UK, school inspectors' notes reveal cases of swearing at the headmaster, causing mayhem in lessons and throwing objects around the class.

At a school where pupils were described as being rude and threatening, one inspector saw a student telling the headteacher to f*** off.

See below

At some schools, schoolchildren used their phones during lessons and were continually swearing and making inappropriate comments.

The inspection of one lesson was called off because all the pupils had decided to “bunk off” leaving just the inspector and the teacher in the classroom.

At Queensbury Upper School, in Dunstable, 40% of lessons were disrupted by bad behaviour.

Nick Seaton, of the Campaign for Real Education, said: "Teachers don’t have enough sanctions to ensure that bad behaviour doesn’t take place."

Aangirfan has the solution to the problem of school discipline:

Give each and every teacher the right to exclude permanently from their classroom the students who are rude and disruptive.

~~

"One school was removed from local government control. It was allowed to choose its staff and teaching methods. Early on, it expelled some pupils. Last summer 69% of pupils got good exam results, at age 16, well above the national average." - aangirfan: SCHOOL REPORT

6 comments:

Anonymous
said...

I concur. I am a professional educator who left the profession for exactly the same reasons. KHS in Brent was the culprit that time. Now I only teach those over 18 who wish to learn. If they don't want to learn, they get the door. Simple as that.What you report is just 1% of what goes on. And it is almost universal now, US, Canada, Australia, Spain etc. etc. I weep for humanity.

The 11 plus Grammer School system was good. If a kid wanted to get to Grammer School and then on to University they had to work hard and pass an exam.

Perhaps if that system was reintroduced, and all the other kids were apprenticed at an early age they might see school as an opportunity instead of a hassle?

School uniforms are usually cheap, practical and affordable for everyone, so I can't see why anyone should be upset about heads enforcing school uniform rules. I do think that Christians ought to be allowed to wear a small plain cross though. No makeup, ever should be allowed at school.

We can't apprentice people if our economy no longer boasts the manufacturing and trades / skills base it had two generations ago. Who would teach them and who could afford to pay for their service when they qualify?

Education and discipline - or lack thereof - begin in the home. Disruptive child at school? Fine the parent. Violent child in school? Fine the parent. Disrespectful child in school? Fine the parent.

Working parents of such children should have to pay a premium on top of their income tax (5% might be a good place to start) to be reduced when behaviour improves. Unemployed parents should lose a corresponding percentage of their welfare payments until the situation improves. Bottom line - these are minors so therefore under the law they are technically not fully answerable for their actions. Therefore any punishment should be imposed on the parents.

Mobile phone providers could also help - a block on all but incoming calls from pre-specified numbers during school time to phones registered to children, no net and no sms during the same hours. The premium levied on parents would fund the cost.

proper sleep is the key. kids go through a relatively rapid process of growth for the first twenty or so years of their lives, thus it is pure lunacy to wake them up at six am to go to school or kindergarten. seeing damp, dark eyelids on the faces of kids is not normal - sleep is essential. I grew tall and smart probably because I never needed to wake up early to go to kindergarten, and in f-land elementary school kids start school on some days as late as 10am, with the shortest days lasting only 4 hours. I would also guess that the short term memory of the youngest of us rarely is capable of holding new information provided of different subjects for eight hours per days.

meditation would be great to improve focus. too bad the only organization actively promoting it into the schooling system (in america) as far as I know is trancendental meditation (r), of which practice occasionally leads to involuntary dissociation. teaching mindfulness meditation to kids would be ideal.